The Main Stream Media’s attempt to rebrand conservatives as alt-right

by SB on November 11, 2016 at 2:30pm

“Alt right” has been the smear of choice, a label put on conservatives and libertarians by a MSM determined to brand them as racist, sexist, homophobic and Islamophobic radicals. So who has been branded alt-right that isn’t and what is the alt-right really?

This is a victory for every American who has been wrongly smeared as racist, sexist or homophobic by the scolds and nannies of the progressive left,” Yiannopoulos said after Donald Trump prevailed on election day.

…”It is the perfect climax to an unstoppable new populist, nationalist revolution sweeping the west. It is mirable dictu, the moment ‘social justice’ died. I couldn’t be more thrilled,” he said

Trouble is, no one seems to know exactly who is and who is not alt-right. Even Yiannopoulos, the media-proclaimed protagonist of alt-righteousness, isn’t actually a member of the club, he tells THR.

“In dozens of interviews I’ve said the opposite. I’m just the only journalist to give them a fair hearing,” says Yiannopoulos, an editor at Breitbart News, which has also been tagged with the “alt-right” label by the mainstream media.

“The left is trying to make it a new swear word,” he says. “They’ve seen this lively, powerful, exciting, funny brand of conservatism and their response is to do what they always do — call them names.”

Alt-right or not, those merely associated with the movement are riding a lucrative media wave. Breitbart’s website, for example, shattered traffic records last month, with 37 million unique visitors.

…As for Yiannopoulos, his star has risen to the point where he’s a sought-after guest on radio and television. Plus, his Dangerous Faggot Tour, where he lectures conservatives on college campuses, is routinely sold out and he’s filming his appearances for a documentary movie.

What’s the alt-right? Well, thousands of words have been written about it in the past few months, usually in the form of lengthy feature articles from left-leaning publications. Rolling Stone magazine says the movement is populated by fans of Trump looking to “reshape American politics by organizing anonymous racists on Twitter,” whileSlate calls it “Euro-style white nationalism” whose standard bearer is Trump.

Those definitions work, though only if you speak to the few prominent people who actually acknowledge being on the alt-right, like Richard Spencer, founder of alternative-right.blogspot.com, and Jared Taylor, founder of American Renaissance, a magazine published by New Century Foundation, a self-described “race-realist, white advocacy organization.”

But the vast majority of conservatives who suddenly find themselves labeled “alt-right” don’t fit that mold at all.

Take James O’Keefe, whose undercover videos have wreaked havoc on the likes of Planned Parenthood, NPR and ACORN. He has been praised on Spencer’s website and his detractors have begun to peg him as alt-right, though he considers himself mainstream conservative.

“They call me a liar, they call me alt-right, they call me a criminal, they can call me Captain Kangaroo, but they are determined not to call me a journalist, because that would threaten their power,” says O’Keefe.

O’Keefe is an independent journalist working through his non-profit, Project Veritas, which has exploded lately with four videos that have been viewed 15 million times in the past two weeks, the most popular of which purportedly shows a Democratic activist admitting to inciting violence at Trump rallies.

…“I was at the third debate when Trump mentioned my video. There were a thousand reporters there, and I heard some of the whisper, ‘Oh, there’s O’Keefe,’ but none of them wanted to talk to me, even though a story I broke was just talked about in the debate. Reporters view me as an existential threat,”

…Mark Dice is another rising online media star who considers himself mainstream conservative but is being called alt-right by his detractors.

“The rise of the alt-right is a direct consequence of social justice warriors trying to shut down conservatives on social media and ruin their careers by organizing cyber mobs to harass people’s employers,”

…Asked why some are gravitating toward the alt-right, Dice cites anger at political correctness. “If you criticize Obama, they call you a racist. If you criticize Hillary, they call you a sexist. If you think it’s weird that liberals are pushing for Disney characters and Luke Skywalker to come out as gay, they call you homophobic,” he says. “Social justice warriors misuse of these terms has all but wiped away their actual meaning.”

While the mainstream media is fixated on the racial aspect of the alt-right movement, Yiannopoulos estimates only 10 percent of those who consider themselves alt-right even care much about skin color.

“It not about white nationalism, it’s about Western ideas being the best, and it’s about political correctness being a cancer. Those ideas motivate millions of voters, so, depending how you define it, all of Trump’s support could be alt-right,” Yiannopoulos says.

“Trump is the product of 30 years of excesses from the left,” he continues. “People who hate the language police are being driven to being even more outrageous, sometimes saying things they don’t even believe just to get a rise out of journalists. The alt-right is a movement that doesn’t care who it offends. It knows ‘racism’ and ‘sexism’ are overused to the point of meaninglessness.”

Case in point, conservative street artist Sabo has been lumped in with alt-right for his sometimes provocative language, including the use of the N-word.

“Growing up in the South, I hated that word, but it is a word,” Sabo says. “And now you have black people punching the shit out of an old white lady and laughing about it on video. I got no problem calling the people who do that ‘n—ers,’

…after Clinton called Trump supporters “deplorable,” he created a “Deplorables” poster based on The Expendables movie, then hung several of them around Hollywood in the dead of night. Over the next two days, he sold $20,000 worth of those posters.

“I was alt-right before there was an alt-right,” says Sabo. “We’re just bold and brash and want to address problems the way we see fit. If we have a problem with the gay community or with feminism, it doesn’t mean we’re against gays or women. Enough is enough with that. The alt-right is fed up. They called the Tea Party racist, now they call the alt-right racist.”

“But the main message of the film is that there are 100 congressmen and 20 senators who couldn’t pass an FBI background check to scrub toilets in the Pentagon,” he says. “We’re out promoting the film and the left is labeling us kooks, crazies, modern-day McCarthyists and alt-right, but we have all the proof to back up our claims.

“When the liberal media says ‘Tea Party,’ it means “racist,’ and when it says ‘alt-right,’ it means ‘racist.’ It’s just another label the media uses to divide conservatives,” says Saul. “The media is trying to rebrand the right. Soon, anybody who is conservative will be a part of the alt-right.”